I throw around the words “fear” and “silence” often when it comes to sex ed. They’re loaded terms, perhaps, but these words best describe my experiences with sex education: my emotional reaction and everyone else’s approach, respectively. These words describe what I feel is not often expressed in the sex education debate.

I'm a male high school student and, frankly, also a cliche. I'm the basic "friend" and I really don't want to be that. I have a lot of guy friends and a lot of girl friends, but no girlfriend. This may sound stupid, but I don't want this to be a foreshadowing of the rest of my life to come. I've never really had a girlfriend, and don't get me wrong, my friends are great....

This a guest post from Shay at The S Spot for the Scarleteen Blogathon

I remember one time when I picked up my younger brother from school, I asked him about his day and he told me that there had been an assembly about sex ed. I asked him if he had learned anything interesting and if he had any questions about anything they talked about (figuring that he might be more comfortable talking to me, his older sibling rather than a “real” adult like mom or dad). He did have a few comments about funny things the teachers had said and how uncomfortable many of them had looked. Then he said, “I didn’t know that condoms don’t protect you from infections or AIDS”.

I'm 20. I had sex with a not-quite-boyfriend, okay, ex-boyfriend who I broke up with but still have feelings for. He decided that it would be fun to try some light bondage. It took me by surprise, but I usually do like that sort of thing. But at certain points...I felt really scared, and at others, I felt pleasure....

Is it consider sexual harassment if some guy fingered my vagina, but I didn't want him to...I'm now 17 and this happened when I was 13, I haven't told anyone about this...I wanna know if it's my fault that this happened. We were on a bus and this guy undid my pants and fingered me. I didn't want it to happen, but I was too scared to stop him. Is it my fault?...

I have a problem, and I'm ready to crack with the stress of it. I've been on birth control (Yaz) for a year, to help with my acne, though I don't always take it at the same time every day. Sometimes I've missed pills or taken them over 12 hours late. That shouldn't really matter, though, because I'm not sexually active. My boyfriend and I have decided to wait until we get married to have sex....

I'm a 17 year old girl and have been dating this guy for a year and a half. I love him and know he loves me. For about the past six months I've been giving him handjobs. We started out slowly. (Through his pants, though his boxers, and then of course through nothing.) Well, recently he has been trying to convince me to let him fingering me. I told him "no" and he was pretty respectful of that....

I am 23. I started having sex with my boyfriend of 7 months at age 17. I was raised Christian, have stayed in the church until now but am seriously questioning what I believe. Ever since I first started having sex I have never been completely ok with it, always wondering whether I was doing something wrong or whether it was even ok....

Can you explain to me what love is please? How does one feel? Can you describe the effects for me? or, is it the kind of thing you just have to know? Does it go away? Or is it something permanent? I think that I am falling in love with my boyfriend.
He is a senior, and I am a junior. Next year he is going off to college, most likely a really prestigious one far away....

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